


Transformers: Fae

by Cindercat13



Series: The Fae Continuity [1]
Category: Transformers: Prime
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Gen, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-17 12:27:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29100267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cindercat13/pseuds/Cindercat13
Summary: After three years of being on earth, it is only now that team prime has their first encounter with a fae, or faes. How will the bots react and how will the Decepticons survive Miko's true rath now?"Stories told, forget your hold.Come with me and show your bold.Your power is of the hour,with this light show these others plight."
Series: The Fae Continuity [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2135130
Kudos: 10





	Transformers: Fae

Lone red grains of dust and rock spanned an ever ending plain of a desert town called Jasper Nevada. A red 1970 dodge challenger car with metal cow horns on the front its hood drove down the countryside roads on its own, the driver seat completely vacant. The vehicle in of itself was actually sentient as it talked over a communication system to a few voices.  
“So there I am on the lookout when out of nowhere these high beams light up my rearview. And then it hits me, I’m illegally parked!” the car said as if it were a good thing. A feminine voice sarcastically came over the cars seemed radio. “But let me guess, another parking ticket?” “Better- the boot.” The car responded. “The big metal tire clamp Impossible to remove?” “Bingo! So the local po-lice do their thing, and I let them get all the way down the block. That’s when I kick off my new shiny shoe, and bang!” “New York’s finest soil themselves.” The female responded. “Well you know me Arcee, mess with Cliffjumper-” the car, apparently called Cliffjumper started, “-And you get the horns.” The female voice who was known as Arcee finished. She was a blue and pink detailed kawasaki ninja 250R motorcycle.  
Cliffjumper laughed a bit before Arcee continued, “not sure how that complies with Autobot rule number one- keep a low profile.” she reminded. “What can I say? Patrolling for energon out here in dullsville gets lonesome, almost makes me miss the Decepticons.” “Like Jasper Nevada’s a party? We’re alone wherever we travel on this rock Cliff.” Cliffjumper was about to respond when he heard a beeping sound off on his scanner.  
  
“I’ve got a signal.” He said with a map coming up on a place that looked like where a GPS would be on a normal car. “Need backup?” Arcee asked, “Do I _ever_ need back up?” Cliff responded then turning abruptly off-road and raced to where he was getting the energon signal. Energon was like their food, if you could call your food liquifying down enough that it became your very blood. All Cybertronian’s needed it to survive, like how humans need water. A raw piece looking like glowing blue crystal.  
Cliff came to a sharp stop at the edge of a massive ditch, and it was scattered with stalagmite energon. Cliff cheered over his comm, “I just found a whole lot of energon!” A shadow then loomed over Cliff as he quickly transformed into his bipedal mode, knowing full well whom it was. “Decepticons.” Cliff said acknowledging the enemy's main ship, the nemesis, flying low over Cliff as it opened a cannon and took one blast at Cliff that sent him flying into the energon he just found. A trapdoor then opened out from under the ship and what dropped out from it were more Cybertronian’s but all of these ones looked identical to each other, almost like factory-built, vehicons. They stood at the ledge Cliff was just on before he was blasted, looking down at him with intent. He turned over and stood back up as they started to advance, “Umm… Arcee? About that backup?” Cliffjumper asked, hoped Arcee got that last message.  
  
“Fair warning boys- I’ll put a few dings in ya.” He threatened, transforming back into his ALT mode and driving up the ledge the vehicons were standing on to get a dropping punch, he transformed back to bot mode mid-air and landed hard, managed to knock a few back with hand to hand combat alone before he was quickly overwhelmed and punched back into the crater he came from, a vehicon managing to slash one of his horns off. Cliff shakily got back up to his peds and faced the vehicon that were now down here with him, “you want the horns?” he asked gritting his denta then transforming his arms and servos into rapid-fire blasters. “You got ‘em!” he roared as he opened fire. The vehicons turning their own arms into blasters and doing the same thing, but as some of their aims missed the red bot, they shot the energon that he was standing in front of. And because raw energon was highly combustible, it blew up. The blast big enough to critically injure but not kill, so Cliff was really injured, but not dead just yet.  
  
  
With Arcee, she did hear Cliff but was unable to respond, so she commed in her boss. “Arcee to Optimus, the cons are back, Cliff might be neck-deep in scrap.” “Understood. Ratchet, do you have Cliffjumper’s coordinates?” the bot who Arcee called Optimus asked, a massive semi-truck with red and blue in paint. “I’m locked on his signal Optimus, but our team is scattered across time zones.” A red and white ambulance that Optimus referred to as Ratchet spoke. “Arcee, Bulkhead, Bumblebee. rendezvous back at base and prepare to ground bridge.”  
  
Back at the location where Cliff found the energon, a green swirling portal appeared in the sky, Ratchet jumped through first then followed up by who Optimus referred to as Bulkhead, a massive dark green bot who turned into an SUV. After him was Arcee and then came a yellow and black bot who Optimus called Bumblebee and who transformed into a muscle car, then finally was Optimus transforming into bot mode as he exited the other side, a guard on his face also acting as a mask. Optimus landed in front of all the others all having blasters at the ready until they saw the empty area of the aftermath of the explosion. They all unarmed themselves and began to look around. “An untapped energon deposit.” Optimus said starting to look around the pit the energon was in before, “what’s left of it.” Bulkhead said. “The first Decepticon activity in three years.” Ratchet said looking to Optimus. “That we know of.” Optimus responded removing his faceplate then continuing, “if they’re scouting for energon, they may be preparing for his return.”  
  
Arcee and Bumblebee had jumped down into the pit to look around when the motorcycle spotted something. Under a small layer of dirt was the shine of one of Cliffjumper’s horns, “no…” Arcee whispered as she gently lifted up the metal to her chest. Ratchet came beside her to have a look followed by the others, she lifted it up and showed it to him, Optimus looking over the medic’s shoulder spoke, “Ratchet, can you track his position?” He nodded and opened up a panel on his arm that showed where the red car’s signal was, he had a few seconds to look at it when it slowly disappeared. “No… Cliffjumper’s life signal just went offline.” The medic said looking up to the departing warship in the sky.  
  
  
A bit earlier, when Cliffjumper was brought onto the nemesis. A lone Cybertronian was looking out over the brigs front window, his reflection looking back at him with bright red eyes. “The energon, it’s worthless to me now.” He growled when he then heard the doors to the brig open up behind him, the vehicons dragging Cliffjumper in and setting him in front of the red-eyed bot. “Scream, it’s been awhile.” Cliffjumper said then coughing up a bit of energon. Who Cliff was speaking to was called Starscream, head SIC of the entire Decepticon faction. Being able to turn into a f-16 fighting falcon with some red details here and there.  
“So, where’s your master?” Cliff asked. “Never mind him! I am my _own_ master.” Starscream then plunged the talons he had for fingers into Cliffjumper’s chest, straight into his energon pump, the equivalent of his heart. The red bot screamed but quietened down when Starscream pulled him close, “any more questions?” the flying Cybertronian asked mockingly before pulling his claws out, Cliff fell down to the floor guided by the tug with a clatter. Dead. Starscream straightened himself then back to ordering the vehicons, “clean that up.”  
  
A little while later, at the present time, Starscream stood in silence in the brig watching the clouds in the sky flow by as the ship flew, when he heard pedfalls come up to him from behind, already knowing who it was he spoke, “Soundwave, what is it?” he asked not yet looking at the faceless bot. Said bot played a recording of Arcee from when she was speaking to Cliff, “ _like Jasper Nevada’s a party? We’re alone wherever we travel on this rock Cliff.­_ ” Starscream already knew well who the voice belonged to, “Ahh, the one called ‘Arcee’. Why just slay one Autobot, when we still have the advantage of surprise?”  
  
  
A few hours later with the Autobots, they stood atop their base of an abandoned missile silo that was hidden under a mountainous rock. The team stood in an arch in front of a small pile of rocks that had been laid down in front of it, Arcee placing Cliff’s horn down. “We must not allow our anger over the loss of Cliffjumper to impair our judgment. As of today, only we five Autobot’s remain on this earth. We owe it to ourselves, to the memory of Cybertron, to any Autobot’s in the galaxy seeking safe harbor, to humankind. And we owe it to the memory of our fallen comrade to survive.” Optimus said in a speech as everyone looked down in respect as the best they could manage for a funeral.  
Once Optimus had finished, Arcee began to walk off. “Arcee?” the prime asked, “Standing around here sulking won’t bring him back. So unless anyone minds, think I’ll get back to protecting humankind.” She responded then transforming and speeding away. “Optimus, helping humans will only result in more tragedy.” Ratchet said watching the bike speed away. “Your opinion is noted.” The prime said to his oldest friend.  
  
In a place not too far from their base was the actual town of Jasper. At a fast food place called K.O drive in a young boy by the name of Jackson Darby was on shift manning the drive-through, “Welcome to K.O drive-in where every patty’s a knockout, may I take your order?” he asked the overhead mic. “Two super combos, extra fries.” The person on the other side said. “Okay dos numero twos, anything else?” Jack asked. “Yeah, some advice. How do I get an awesome job like yours?” the guy asked mockingly when laughing followed behind it, possibly the passengers. Jack retorted, “so that’s two ‘we’re not as funny as we think we are’ combos with a side of bight me.” The guy laughed before registering what Jack said, “what’d you say?!” Jack wasn’t fazed by this and spoke into the mic again, “$5.59 sir, at the window.”  
As Jack looked away after placing the food on the windowsill, the car quietly rolled up and then the driver snatched the bag and drove off laughing, “Hey!” Jack called watching them speed off but the car was already a little ways away, Jack would have the money that cost taken out of his paycheck for such a stupid move. Until he got an idea and grinned in the direction the car left.  
  
He looked up at the security camera that looked over the counter area, and while looking at it he made a gesture with his hand. Thumb, pointer, and pinkie finger out, then turning his thumb up and flicking his other two fingers forward in a- ‘shoo’ motion. Once he was confident that the camera saw him he rapped both hands on the counter in front of the window before flicking them over it, “Telropo.” He simply said then the food that was just stolen appeared in front of him in a small flash of glossed white. Jack grinned, the food didn’t look like it had been touched yet so he gently pushed it to the side and waited for the person to come back and get it, and this time he was paying.  
The same car pulled back up at the window and the driver with his window down didn’t look to pleased, in fact, he was sneering. “$5.59 if you would,” Jack said mockingly and smug at the teen who Jack recognized as his schools bully Vince Rich. Vince reached to the side and brought out what looked like a ten-dollar note, Jack was about to grab it when he could then suddenly feel the alchemy magic radiating off it. Jack still with his hand outstretched casted another word, “reale-vive.” The money then turned into a small corps of a decaying kitten, Vince shrieked and threw the body at Jack who quickly closed the window and the body hit it with a thump.  
  
It is around the time to mention what exactly was happening. You see, in this world, magic and fae and monsters were a very real thing, not just make believe, but the people who weren’t these faes and monsters did believe they were fake. That was what the gesture Jack made before with his hand was, it was a warning to the person who went over the footage to cut the next little bit out or so, so no one saw him perform magic.  
Jack was quite simply a wizard, one of the most powerful magic users alongside fairy’s in the fae community, or as his type really called themselves, shifters. Wizards were able to understand and learn any form of magic as long as it was actually teachable and not unique. Vince was an alchemist, not to dissimilar to a wizard except they had a natural ability to combine science and magic together, the law of equation they called it. And that was exactly what Vince had done to that corps, putting a temporary exchange on it to make it look like money until Jack took it, the dead body of a cat was considered extremely bad luck or fortune to wizards and witches which was probably why Vince tried to give him it.  
  
Jack looked at the window and used a cleaning spell to get rid of the splat and fur that landed on the glass, “clee a-lee.” He then opened the window again and looked to see what Vince had disgustingly thrown at him, alchemist’s did believe in science over magic so it wasn’t to out there that Vince wouldn’t want to hold a rotting body and possibly get sick.  
When Jack looked down he saw the dead form of the black kitten, and immediately brought it up to himself by flouting it to look it over. It clearly had been dead for a little while but it was still small enough that Jack could attempt to try something, he just hoped he wasn’t too late. “Revalchi, comproe lavale mandica!” Jack casted. Nothing happened to it for a second, until the body started to heal itself, the magots were pushed out, the organs started to have the moisture come back to them before they were covered over by skin and then the fur started to grow back, and the dirt started to disappear. What was left was a healthy black kitten looking around two weeks old, the reason it was considered back luck or fortune to a wizard or witch to find a dead cat was because some palettes were believed to boost their magic back in the day, that wasn’t the case though but it was like how normal human’s considered karma or that breaking a mirror brought bad luck. Jack opened a portal that lead to a personal pocket dimension and pulled out a white hoodie he owned and wrapped the sleeping kitten in it, then looking over to Vince who looked a little awed at what just happened right in front of him.  
Jack then did something called a ‘shift’ basically the process of transforming into the type of monster you are, some had shifts and some didn’t but most of the time they did. Jack’s shift was of course a wizard, his hair turned silver and grey, his ears becoming pointed, and the blue in his eyes turning brighter and started to glow as his pupils turned silver and glowed as well. He was mad, that was made very apparent, he glared at Vince and without even looking mentally made the food to the side combust in flames. “Sorry sir, I’m afraid I’m going to have to refuse your service. I’d advise you to leave.” Vince glared back and was about to speak when Jack did one thing better that would get the jerk out of his sight. He muttered something inaudible and then suddenly the car was gone, it had being teleported to the outskirts of town. Jack chuckled a little bit when he looked back to the kitten then to the clock, his shift was over now so he could start to head home.  
  
After he clocked off a few minuet’s later, he walked out with his white hoodie on backward and the sleeping kitten in the hood under his chin. He pulled on the strings of the hood tightening it so that if the kitten woke up it wouldn’t fall out, then felt his phone vibrate in his pocket so he stopped to answer it, “hey mum, I just got off. No, I’m not going to the dance, experience suggests I should never cut a rug, unless I’m installing carpet. ‘Be careful’? Seriously? This is Jasper.” Jack talked while subconsciously wandering when a familiar motorcycle caught Jack’s eye that was parked in front of the door.  
  
  
After Arcee had left she drove into the town of Jasper, activating a holo-form that she called Sadie. With the sun of the late day casting a gold effect across the town she drove around to maybe try and clear her head. She had have this happen before, losing a partner. As she rolled, two purple and identical cars had spotted her and begun to follow, when she noticed their presence her side mirror turned slightly so she could have a look, grimly hushing out her frustration in one word. “Twins.” She then sped up and turned into the car park of the K.O drive-in, watching as they drove past and looked to go in another direction. “Take five Sadie.” Arcee said then putting her stan up and making her holo-form disappear, she at least had a few minuet’s to kill when she noticed a teenage human boy with black hair and blue eyes walk out of the building she was parked in front of, and if she could correct herself later she was pretty sure the type of clothing peace he had on was backwards.  
  
  
Back to the present, Jack watched as the bikes polish gleamed in the sunlight left. “I love you…” he whispered before realizing he was still on the phone, “y-yeah I love you too mum, I gotta run.” He said quickly hanging up then walking over to the motorcycle. “Hello beautiful, where have you been all my life?” he said running his hands along the seat before hopping on, “It may take a few K.O paychecks, but I’m gonna own a ride just like you someday.” “Are you talking to your motorcycle?” a girl suddenly asked from beside him who was also with another girl, the two laughed as Jack tried to cover for himself that he wasn’t a creep. “Uh my motorcycle? No I-I mean yes!” Jack said stuttering and failing a few times before collecting himself and addressed the girl that had spoken to him, “how’s things Sierra? Take you for a spin some time?” he asked. Arcee was almost trying to mentally will the human boy off of her when she saw the two vehicons start to approach her from behind, “come on smooth operator wrap it up.”  
“You know my name?” Sierra asked sounding surprised, “We’re in homeroom together, I’m Jack, Jack Darby.” Jack said flashing his eyes blue at her and she responded by flashing hers green at him as well and the girl next to her. These two were Sierra Orchid and her little sister Linzy, the both of them being tropic fae, basically any sort of exotic looking thing to do with nature they could control. The two older teens were suddenly stopped when two purple cars shined their headlights in their direction and then charged at them.  
  
The girls screamed and began to run when Arcee came to life and sped off with Jack still on her. The young wizard screamed as he was suddenly speeding into the direction of two cars, afraid he was going to crash and burn when the bike suddenly did a wheely and drove through the two cars before speeding off down the road, the cars in hot pursuit.  
Once the two got a little further away, Arcee spoke to Jack, “do not let go.” “Who said that?!” Jack screamed as he was raced down the street. The two cars managed to catch up to them and cornered them at their left and right, Arcee then hit the brakes and allowed the two vehicons to hit themselves before speeding off again. Once the cons had straightened themselves they commed into Starscream, “commander Starscream, target sighted accompanied by a human youth.” The jet responded, “destroy them both!” the vehicons then sped up again and after them.  
  
Arcee turned into an ally and came to a stop as Jack wasted no time in hopping off, “what are you?” he asked panickily. Jack knew this thing was alive, but he couldn’t sense any form of magic about it. There was no possible way for an inanimate object to gain sentience without a form of magic, and Jack being a wizard would be able to sense that. The bike then threateningly revved toward him to get her point across, “I don’t exist. Tell anyone about me and I will hunt you down.” Jack was almost frightened enough to maybe cast a harmful spell at the bike but he used his magic instead to run, just enough to boost his legs. As he ran he opened up his hood to see that the kitten was okay and still asleep, Jack knew the cat would wake up on its own time because it was being brought back from the dead after all, but to make sure it didn’t get shot out while he ran he closed the hood entirely, and casted a spell to make sure that the cat could still breath.  
  
After Jack ran off, Arcee sped off again to now just get away from the cons when one of them turned down the street and after Jack as another still pursued her. “Scrap!” she said turning around sharply then jumping over the vehicon that was chasing her and turning down the alley to come back for Jack. As the said wizard ran he casted a spell that shot a lightning strike at the car hoping that would do something to at least slow it down, “thuncly!” he shouted. When it hit, it stunned the car a bit but Arcee was quickly around the corner and driving alongside him. “Hop on!” she shouted, Jack wasted no time in jumping back on and then they both sped out the alley and onto the main road before coming onto a freeway in which the vehicons responded by opening blasters at them.  
Jack ducked his head low as Arcee did evasive maneuvers, “why are those guys shooting at us?!” Jack asked. “There’s no ‘us’ kid, and they’re no ‘guys’ either.” That at least made Jack more comfortable if he had to shoot them again. As they sped down the highway they dodged and weaved through cars, when Arcee heard a familiar loud engine as a yellow muscle car with black details came speeding up a side road crashing into the vehicons before going to cover the twos flank. “Friend of your?” Jack asked, “family.”  
Bumblebee swerved side to side as he blocked the vehicons from passing him when one of them caught him in the side and made him spin out a bit, but it was just enough time so that Arcee and the cons were already miles away. Bumblebee revved back up and charged after them.  
  
A little bit away from the action was a manmade creak, and in it was a boy in his preteens playing with a remote control electric car and making mock car engine noises when his phone rang in his pocket, he flipped it open and answered it. “Hi mama. Racing, right up the street. Okay, just five more minutes.” He then pocketed his phone and continued with his playing when he abruptly had his eyes flashed white. In a quick panic he backed up closer to the wall and looked up over his head to where he saw the blue motorcycle about to speed down, the boy heard screaming before the bike and the vehicle in question he predicted came down then stopping in front of him with a screech and the person who was screaming before belonged to Jack. Despite already seeing it in his vision, the boy still thought it was cool to see it play out in actual time. “Whoa,” he awed. Jack groaned and hopped off the bike trying to stand on weak legs, “ugh, you gave no idea.”  
Introducing Rafael Esquivel or Raf as he liked to be called, a future psychic being able to read people's mind, move things with his mind, and being able to predict the future in short bursts, which was how he knew Jack was coming.  
  
Raf’s eyes flashed white for a second when a look of panic then crossed his face, Jack saw this and could immediately tell that Raf was a shifter and that something was wrong because only physics and some spirits had eyes that glowed like that. The tween looked up to where Jack had come down from and what was there now were the vehicons that had been chasing him, they raced down the slope and when they launched into the air they transformed into bot mode and landed with a ‘thud’, blasters at the ready. Arcee transformed from behind the boys and looked at them with a fury, “this ends here cons.” She said then getting into a stance and charging at them, dodging their blaster fire then delivering a down kick, and beginning to fight them off.  
Raf watched with awe, he wished he was a little more adept in his future sight otherwise he could have seen this coming. “What are they?” he asked Jack without looking away, the older boy was honestly in the same boat, “Talking cars that turn into robots, or the other way around.” Jack said watching Arcee beat the dent into them. “This, is, for, Cliff.” She grunted out as she hit punch after punch to the vehicons head. The con didn’t look too phased and when it righted its head then aimed its blaster at Arcee and began to fire. The two-wheeler began to backflip away to get some distance when she was struck in the chest mid flip by a shot.  
  
Jack looked to the two cons and was about to cast a combustion spell at the cons when they heard tires screech above them on the highway, the yellow muscle car that helped before flew off the bridge and transformed mid-air to reveal another bot. He stomped on one con and then clocked the other in the face with a solid punch, Arcee managed to sit up and begin to make her way forward while Bumblebee still kept fighting, when he took a step back to gain some distance he accidentally crushed the toy car Raf was playing with before under ped, the tween didn’t predict to maybe move it. Bumblebee looked to Raf and made an odd buzzing noise, which Raf heard pretty clear as an apology. **“Oh. Ah, sorry about that.”** Bumblebee said in his buzzing. “No problem really,” Raf said, and to prove his point the boy's iris’s glowed white as he mentally pulled all the pieces back and reassembled his small car holding it in his hands when it dropped, he lifted it up to show the bot and Bumblebee was wowed but also very confused, he didn’t think humans could do that.  
The act surprised the cons to but they were the first to remember that they were still fighting, one blasted Bee at point-blank with a weak shot sending the bot back a bit but not exactly injuring him. When the two cons came up to Bee they stomped him into the concrete with blaster ready to fire point-blank at full power, Raf then interjected, “leave him alone!” he shouted getting the attention of the con. When they pointed their blasters at them Raf suddenly became meek, “please?” he whimpered out. “Bad call.” Jack said trying to usher the physic away when one of them started to get close to them, once the bot was too close he stood in front of Raf and snapped his fingers at the bot shouting a spell, “combasion!” the con that was closest to them suddenly erupted in flames and started to panic as it backed away, that was enough of a distraction for Jack to then pull Raf away and into a sewer line they could fit into. “Come on! Come on!” he shouted as they ran. “What did we just see?” Raf asked as they made their getaway, “no idea, and I’m not sure I want to find out.” Jack said making their way down the sewer.  
  
Back with the bots, Bumblebee managed to fend off the con who had pinned him, and when the other had the flames put out it was back to beating the scrap out of the scout. He was then sent back into Arcee’s direction, and once she had collected herself and saw Bee skidding toward her she was quick to help him back up to his peds and get back into a fighting stance, when they heard a car horn honking as bright lights came up from behind them, the SUV quickly transformed and who stood behind them now pounding his fists together was Bulkhead, “who’s ready to rumble?” he asked taking a stance. The vehicons turned tail and peeled out as soon as they were outnumbered.  
The trio quickly deflated after it was finally over, “what took you?” Arcee asked. “Traffic.” Bulkhead responded.  
  
  
When they returned back to base they all had a lot to report back to Optimus about. “And the cons would have been scrap metal if I hadn’t been distracted by the human.” Arcee said while standing next to Bumblebee. “Human?” Optimus asked, **“two boys,”** Bee responded. “Two boys.” Optimus repeated. “I guess a second one caught us in action, I don’t know, ‘was a little busy at the time.” Arcee said looking up at Bee as if it was his fault. The prime ignored this and continued, “if the Decepticons are targeting us anyone perceived as our ally will be at grave risk.” **“That’s another thing, these humans did not act normal. One I accidentally crushed the toy of, and he said it was fine, but then out of nowhere his optics turn solid white and the pieces of the toy fly back to him and reassemble in the air before he catches it looking good as new! And then the older one, when one of the vehicons got to close he said some weird made-up word but then the con combusted into flames as they made their getaway.”** Bee explained. “Now that you mentioned it, when I first saw him at some point I thought I saw his optics glow blue for a second but I wrote it off as the light maybe reflecting off them oddly. But then when I had tried to drop him off, a con went back down the alley he ran to, and when I turned around and got there the con looked to be shorting out with a lot of electricity. I don’t know if humans are meant to do that.” Arcee explained. “If humans can do that, I would have thought maybe Agent Fowler would have warned us or demonstrated it to us, I think this could be leading up to a trap.” Ratchet said from off to the side in the med bay. “Regardless of how we perceive these children, if they are even in the slightest chance not with the Decepticons, they will be targeted and pursued for the abilities they have displayed. Arcee, Bumblebee, the two of you will seek for the boys tomorrow at the local school, I believe we will find them there tomorrow.”  
  
With Jack, after he had dropped Raf off and they had gone their separate ways, he teleported home just to be on the safe side, when he reappeared in his room he opened his hood to see that the kitten was still asleep and thankfully still breathing. Jack sighed in relief and took off the hoodie to rest it on his bed, he looked inside its mouth to see that it still didn’t have its canines so he would have to bottle feed it, oh how he could already see how his mum was going to react, as long as it was his complete responsibility to look after the cat then he could keep it, and to help with that he was already thinking of turning it into his familiar. Familiars are basically pets, plus-plus, they could perform magic and could understand speech and if the person who made the familiar was powerful enough they could also access some powerful magic at their master permission. So this little kitten would be able to really help Jack, now to see about a name.  
Jack lifted its tail up and saw that it was a boy, so a masculine name would be acceptable here. Jack lifted the kitten up and moved it over to a wooden desk he had in his room that had an interchangeable magic circle carved into it, he looked to the shelves above it and grabbed a bottle of ground powdered herb and gave it a light sprinkle over the circle then placed the kitten in it. He proceeded to cast a small spell and in a few seconds an image of what the cat would look like as a grown-up appeared, it was still a solid black with bright blue eyes. This gave Jack an idea, he had always been fond of the movie Coraline and if he remembered correctly the cat's name in that film was Charlie which meant- ‘free man’, this cat certainly was free from being dead so it made sense. “Okay little guy, Charlie it is.”  
  
Jack then proceeded into the spell that turned normal animals into familiars, so that when the kitten woke up he would be able to understand him. Jack gave him some beginner cat familiar spells that should help the little guy if he ever needed to make an escape, then he gave him some more hardcore spells, this was basically the process of designing a video game avatar. In the end, the little guy had: a basic healing spell, perspective teleporting; a method of teleporting that if Charlie moved behind a place then he would disappear and could reappear from another object, shadow mancy; a method of controlling shadows to turn into solid surfaces or even teleport, and finally, spirit animal; a spell that turned him into a big black leopard-cheetah-lion hybrid, but that was reserved for when he was older, and obviously, extended life. Couldn’t have the little guy dying on him in eighteen years’ time.  
Jack grinned at his accomplishment but then heard a cough in his doorway, he looked to see his father’s old familiar standing there, Shen. Shen was a white peacock and after Jack’s father left he also left Shen behind as well, the white peafowl was responsible for teaching Jack all he knew about magic as he was his mentor. And looking from next to Shen’s leg, was a gifted familiar that Jack’s dad gave his mum, a jerboa mouse she called Jay. Jay was mainly a person who tried to help around the house if he could, and also on a few occasions tried to get a job so he could help out with the finances but because he has no human background with nothing like a birth certificate, he was always denied.  
  
Jack chuckled a bit and lifted Charlie into his lap, “Hey guys, look who I saved.” Jack said petting the little kitten. “We can see that.” Shen said walking forward and inspecting the cat more closely. “We could sense the cat here the second you brought it here, and now we can tell he’s a familiar, so what’s his name?” Jay asked turning into his human avatar so he wasn’t so small. “I think Charlie suits him, he’s been through a lot. Vince threw him at me today as a dead corpse when I teleported his food back that he didn’t pay for.” Shen immediately had his feathers ruffled at the name, knowing full well of the bully Vince. “Ugh, that’s alchemists for you. Never considerate of the other, only caring about themselves to cure their curiosity.” Jay said crossing his arms. Everyone could agree to that.  
Shen then looked back up to Jack, “Is this why you were late today? Were you off getting supplies?” he asked. Jack then looked like a dear in headlights as the memories of what he had witnessed came rushing back. Jack hissed/groaned through his teeth as he didn’t think he wanted to bring up what he saw to these two yet, they were like family, but he didn’t think they would believe him if he told them. Sentient machines that turn into robots without magic? Because there was no way technology was that advanced, the only explanation Jack could think of as to why that would happen is if they were aliens that just happen to look like machines. “No, it wasn’t… I need to think on it.” Jack said then going into a bit of a pause before he looked at the two properly, “I need to do some research on how to look after this guy and then I’ll summon or mold the equipment here, could you guys give me a little space? I’ll come out and help with dinner after I’m done.” Jack said placing the little kitten into his hoodie again. “Sure, we’ll see you soon if we don’t check up on you first.” Jay said turning back to normal and jumping out of the room. Shen nodded and walked out as well but not before taking one last look at the boy, he still felt he owed the boy so much because of the biggest question he could never answer for the teen, where did his father go? Shen wishes he knew himself, and he wished he could hide his own hurt at the thought as well because he himself was also abandoned, left to help raise his old partner's son.  
  
  
The next morning, Jack woke up to an unusual thing. It was Charlie gently patting his face with his paw while standing on his chest, the little guy looked at Jack in the eye and also sniffed him a bit. Jack groaned and looked over to his nightstand to see that his phone read it was ten minute's before his alarm was supposed to go off to get him up, the teen felt a little annoyed but ignored it, ten minuet’s more time awake than usual big whop. Jack gently moved the little guy off his chest and saw that the little guy looked better than before, he now looked to be around three weeks old as he looked a lot more put together in a mature sense. “Hey little guy, I hope you slept well.” Jack said noticing how the cat seemed to look at him with amazement and then nodded with the best smile a cat could do. “At least you can understand me.” Jack said then getting up to get dressed while the kitten sat on his bed.  
  
Once Jack was done he had to lay some ground rules since he had to leave for school soon. “Okay Charlie, Shen and Jay are in charge until I get back. Be good, I’ll see you guys later, please teach him well.” Jack said getting ready to leave out the door. “Basic 101, got it.” Jay said in his human avatar mode with a thumbs up, he didn’t want the new kitten to be chasing him. “If you don’t get going you’ll be schooled by your mother when she gets up in a few minutes, get going already.” Shen said in his human avatar as well as he watched the teen begin to leave, Jack waved and closed the door behind him before running off down the sidewalk.  
  
  
Once school was over, it was another grueling day that took the smile off of Jack’s face. Vince wasn’t all too happy with him about yesterday and had welded his locker closed, so it was annoying to have to wait until the hall was empty before he could turn it back to normal with a time spell he had been practicing with for a while now. He just couldn’t wait until he got home to see how Charlie was doing, hopefully he had a better day than him, until he was called over by Raf. The preteen was standing under a tree and waved the older boy over as he completely missed the familiar blue and pink motorcycle.  
“Raf, hey. Look let’s just keep this between us and forget anything ever happened okay?” Jack said when he heard a car horn coming down the road next to them and what soon parked up was a yellow muscle car. Raf gasped in excitement while Jack backed away, ready to cast a spell if need be. “Oh, not again.” Jack said backing away. Bumblebee pulled up and opened his passenger side door for Raf and buzzed a bit, Jack took a guess at what the bot thing was saying. “It wants us to get in?” the older boy asked not sounding too sure. “No, just me.” Raf said, Jack did a double-take looking at Raf with a surprised look, “how do you know that?” he asked until he just realized who he asked that question to. Raf looked up at him with a raised brow but answered his question anyway, “it said so, yours is over there.” He said pointing to Arcee who was still parked in front of the stairs.  
  
Jack had a very horrible feeling about this, everything on this planet had an aura of magic on it, whether it be an inanimate object or living thing. But these robots or whatever they were, they had no magic, they only had this sense like they have magic around them but they didn’t generate it themselves. The only explanation Jack could think of is if they came from a place that didn’t have magic, or a place that didn’t have magic in the same sense they do.  
While Jack was thinking of this, Raf had gone ahead and jumped in Bee’s seat, “Hey, how’s it going?” the preteen asked as Bee closed his door before Jack had the opportunity to stop them. “Hey wait! Stop!” Jack called after the car as it sped away. He gave in though, and guessed that they were going where the talking cars wanted to go, but he would be dammed if he was hopping on that bike, so he was going to walk it. He could track Raf’s magic aura, so he began what he thought was going to be a long walk to follow the preteen.  
  
While that was happening, sitting on the stone railing of the stairs was an exchange student who was actually drawing Arcee as she was parked. This person was Miko, another shifter like Jack and Raf who was an oni, a Japanese demon of sorts that riddled in dark magic mostly, especially the females while the boy's boar weapons and fought hand to hand. Not Miko though, she did cast spells, but they were for summoning weapons, she acted a lot more like a male oni than a girl as she loved the thrill of a fight. “Coolest bike ever.” She whispered as she drew Arcee with a pencil and sketchbook, she loved all sorts of arts, and drawing was one of her favorite pass times, until she was annoyingly interrupted by her phone going off. She opened it to see it was her host parents, “host parents? Ignore.” She said closing her phone and going back to her drawing when she realized the bike was gone and she just managed to see it driving away out the corner of her eye, she groaned and chased after it.  
  
Arcee had put up her holo-avatar and sped after Jack who turned down an alleyway so he could maybe teleport after Raf but Arcee had beat him to it, she curved in front of him to make him stop. “Relax, I just want to talk to you.” “Don’t you mean you and your new friend?” Jack said looking up to the avatar who he could sense also didn’t have any magic about them, but was surprised when it disappeared in a flicker like tech. “Kid there’s a lot you don’t understand.” Arcee said. “No I-I get it, I get it. The first rule of robot fight club is that you don’t talk about robot fight club.” Jack said becoming a little unstable as he was already thinking of spells that could either get him out of here or distract the bot, the combustion spell he cast yesterday seemed to work on that one guy.  
But let words try their best first, she is basically an alien after all, who knows what could happen if he tried some certain spells on it, maybe it would give her a boost instead. “What _you_ need to understand is that I don’t want a bunch of crazy talking vehicles following me around, trying to get me killed.” Jack said turning around to maybe walk to a different alleyway. Arcee transformed behind him and looked the young wizard down while crouching, “look. ‘Jack’ is it? Your personal safety is exactly why Optimus Prime has requested your presence.” She said. “Optimus who?” Jack asked wondering if maybe that name should ring a bell, but he was also quickly becoming unstable as Arcee leaned in and Jack was about ready to throw a spell and book it, Raf was a powerful psychic, he should be able to take care of himself. “You are maybe in danger because you are one of the few, one of the _only_ who have ever seen us.” Jack was about ready to throw a spell when he heard a voice behind him. “Dude what are you waiting for?! Go with!” Miko said from leaning out behind the corner. There was a pause from Arcee before she said solidly, “scrap.” Jack could guess that was a sort of swear word.  
  
  
The quintet were then on the open road as they drove out from Jasper and onto its outer desert plains, Miko hollering as the wind blew past them. “And why exactly are we taking her?” Jack asked. “Rules.” Was Arcee’s simple answer as they came driving up to a steep mountain. When they actually drove off-road and right up to the base of the mountain Jack screamed a bit, ready to launch him and Miko off the bike when the stone actually opened and revealed a massive door that lead them into a long hall that then lead to the main room as Arcee and Bumblebee slowed down. The teens all awed and wowed at the sight as they pulled up and came to a stop.  
The first bot the shifters saw was Ratchet, as they pulled up, he turned around from what he was working on that seemed to be computers his size and watched them cautiously as they pulled up. Another bot was Bulkhead as he walked forward to meet the humans but stopped short so he could give room to Arcee and Bumblebee to transform. When the teens hopped off or out they walked up to the two bots they haven’t seen yet, Ratchet spoke, “I thought there were two.” “Haven’t you heard? Humans multiply.” Arcee said with sarcasm.  
  
Raf took it on himself to speak first, “I’m Raf.” “I’m Miko, who are you?” Miko asked jogging up to Bulkhead. “Bulkhead…” the green bot responded not sure how to react to the little pink-haired girl. Miko gasped, “are you a car? I bet you’re a truck, a monster truck! Do you like heavy metal? How much do you weigh? Ever use a wrecking ball as a punching bag?” she asked firing a slew of questions and trying to resist the urge to grow to his size to ask him directly, she still didn’t know if Raf and Jack were fae.  
“So if you guys are robots, who made you?” Raf asked, it being an honestly innocent question. But Ratchet seemed to take offense to it, “puh-lease.” He scoffed out. They all then felt heavy pedfalls walk their way, everyone looked to who those steps belonged to, and soon Optimus stood before them. “We are autonomous robotic organisms from the planet Cybertron, also known as Autobots.” Jack didn’t feel comfortable around the biggest guy one bit, but he stood forward to maybe protect Miko and Raf, but he had to again, let his words come first. Rashness brought rashes his mother always said. “Why are you here?” he asked, “to protect your planet from the Decepticons.” Was the bots vain answer, but Arcee seemed to cover it. “The jokers who tried to bump us off last night.” Miko though seemed to thrive in joy when she heard that and burst out, “You two got to fight some of these guys?! Oh I wish I could have seen that! I would have sent them to the next century!” Miko said shouting while her eyes began to glow red. This didn’t go unnoticed by the bots.  
  
Ratchet was the first to speak up, “what is wrong with your eyes?” he asked. “Huh?” Miko asked looking at Jack and Raf for clarification. “That’s what I saw yesterday with him,” Arcee said pointing to Jack, “his optics glowed blue and Bee did say the smaller one's optics glowed white.” She said then referring to Raf. Both Jack and Raf showed their shift to Miko who understood what they were on about when they said her eyes.  
Jack’s full shift changed his clothes, so he had wizarding robes on that consisted of a hooded poncho over his head and a belt with what looked like a few string bags tied to it and a wand. His hood hid his silver and grey hair from the front and his ears were hidden by the hood as well but they still poked from under it and the glowing blue in his eyes, as well as the silver in his pupils, made him seem very ominous, noticing how it affected the bots he flipped the hood back to reveal his face.  
Raf was actually a simple one, his sclera took over his entire eyes as they glowed white brightly, he was gently lifted off the ground as his hair waved like seaweed all while having a white aura cover him. “You have all been here for three years, I’m surprised agent Fowler hasn’t told you to be cautious of shifters or any other type of fae.” Raf said with an unfocused gaze as if he was staring off into space. The bots all looked at Raf as if he was a titan in the room, how did the kid know about that? Raf’s eyes glowed brighter as he looked up, seeming to become more focused. “Bumblebee didn’t tell me during the time Arcee was talking to Jack, to put it simply, shifters are a sort of subspecies of human that can transform into mythical monster rooted in our culture. I for example am a future psychic, I can move things with my mind, read people’s minds, and look into the past or future, sort of like how Alfa Tryion could with the book he was always writing in Orion Pax.” Raf said then shaking his head and his eyes returning to normal. Every-bot was now shocked and on guard as they looked down at the smallest human, none of them had said a thing about Optimus’s name before he was a prime. Optimus though while surprised, was more wowed than anything, not even Megatron knew about Alfa Tryion and his book and quill, so it would be silly to assume that the rest of the Decepticons knew, and Optimus believed Raf knew that, he knew exactly what to say next so they didn’t start to shoot at them. The primes face turned into a small smile, this child was good, he knew it.  
  
Arcee transformed her arms into blasters and pointed them at the teens with an aggressive expression, before Optimus could tell her to stand down Jack made a bubble shield around them as he glared just as intensely back at Arcee, ready to get himself and the others out of here if push came to shove. “Hey! you’re the ones who brought us here, who do you think you are?!” Miko shouted shifting a little as her teeth pushed out and the pink in her hair turning bright red as she came up to the shield to get as close as she could to Arcee, ready for a fight as she actually seemed eager. “Arcee, stand down. I do not believe these little ones are a part of the Decepticons in the slightest, what Raf said is true to an extent. The Decepticons do not know of the book my old teacher used to write in, I believe Raf has indeed either looked into the past or has read my mind, same to the rest of us, to possibly receive our names since only Bulkhead has introduced himself.” That did make Arcee put her weapons away but it didn’t ease the atmosphere that was now created.  
Jack believed the immediate danger was gone so he slowly lowered the shield. “Miko do not growl, that will make things worse.” Raf said looking at the oni, “but I didn’t growl.” She responded. “You were about to.” Raf warned. “Okay talk then, what is Miko then if you are a- ‘future psychic’” Arcee said standing straight, ready to transform her blasters again if need be. “I’m an oni, a powerful dark fighting spirit, and I’m not afraid to smash some metal if you push it.” Miko said sneering her teeth at the female bot. “I’m a wizard, basically a powerful magic user which is what you saw me do against that Decepticon when it went up in flames, and the shield I made just before.” Jack said putting a hand on Miko’s shoulder and pulling her back.  
  
“Optimus, you cannot be serious in keeping these _humans_ here any longer,” Ratchet said with venom. “It’s clear they can handle themselves, they do not need our protection.” “As I said before old friend, if the Decepticons were to capture them they could be exploited for their abilities they have just displayed. It is our responsibility to protect them even if they are capable.” Ratchet was about to rebuttal when Raf cut him off, “if you did follow that logic then there wouldn’t even be a sense in having a team here, all of you are capable to fight off Cons, but you all stick together anyway.” “Exactly,” Optimus said silently thanking the little boy for explaining it to his old friend who could be a bit stubborn at times. “I’m just glad I could help, and I think it’s just his way of trying to politely say he’s scared, creeped out and he’s concerned for the rest of you if any of you got hurt by us.” The little psychic said reading the mind of the prime again and also reading Ratchets. Bulkhead looked to Ratchet with a big ‘ol smile on his face, “aw, you do care Ratchet,” Bulk said to the doc who walked over to his desk before grabbing a wrench and chucking it at Bulkhead.  
  
Before Raf or Jack could catch it Miko had beat them to it, she grew to her more comfortable height which was just as tall as Bulkhead. Her skin was dark pink and her hair still dyed bright red with dark blue horns in a crown-like position over her head, she had a loincloth around her waist and a strapless crop top around her chest. Her muscles grew very noticeably and she had claws on each toe and finger as well as the classic oni teeth bending off to the sides of her mouth which were in a smirk as she looked at Ratchet who had a shocked almost terrified face. “Wow, if I didn’t know any better, I’d just say you’ve just seen a ghost.” Miko said mockingly while looking smugly at the medic before walking forward.  
The bots minus Optimus were suddenly on edge again as Miko approached Ratchet sauntering, she leaned over him with a smug look almost face to face with him which the doctor returned with a sneer almost. She slid her hand past the medic then left laughing a little, when the medic looked behind him he saw that the wrench he threw at bulkhead was there, he had just been completely duped into being scared for no reason and that seemed to humor Miko. “Out of my 1,500 years I never thought successfully spooking an alien would ever be a thing I would live to see or do, ha-ha!” Miko laughed. “That’s an oni for you, dark spirits that thrive of negativity.” Jack said watching Miko then shrink down to size and turn back to normal. Ratchet now a little annoyed looked at the young wizard, “if that’s the case why doesn’t she actually join the cons? I’m sure she’ll get the best kick out of life there.” Before anyone could argue, Miko stood up for herself proudly. “Watch it Ratchet, my nature might be to smile at negativity, but my morals are stronger as I protect the ones I see as worthy.” She said smiling up nicely at the green bot who slowly but surely returned the favour.  
  
That was when Bumblebee chimed in, he was curious since Raf could understand him if he had been reading his mind the entire time. **“Hey Raf, have you been reading my mind this entire time then if you can understand me?”** Bee asked. “A bit of both, I’m also I guess you could say a bit of a techy.” Raf said sheepishly. “Wait, what did that guy say?” Miko asked sounding really confused as she looked up at the yellow and black muscle car. “He asked if I could understand him by reading his mind,” Raf said letting them connect the pieces by his answer. “Why _is_ he talking like that? Can he not talk like you guys for some reason?” Jack asked honestly hitting a cord in Bee as the young bot seemed to droop. “Bumblebee, unfortunately, lost his voice box in the line of duty,” Ratchet said watching the poor scout when Jack got an idea. He might as well help with injuries if he could, that was what wizards used to do way back when during the wars, or more accurately, make loopholes around them. “Hey Raf, could you read my mind for a second, I wanna talk.” “Sure.” Raf said then having his eyes glow white.  
Raf could see Jack’s plan, he just needed some info which he believed Raf could help him with. First, he needed a few lines of dialog from Bee’s old voice box which the scout should be able to remember, Raf connected to Bee’s memories and picked out the some that had him talking and he lends them over to Jack after he cropped them so it was only Bee speaking. Once Jack received them he held out a small pebble and muttered something, a spell so that the dialog was logged in the pebble and he could access it later. It then dawned on him that he remembered what Ratchet said, that Bee had lost his voice in the line of duty. After a bit of thinking, Jack then wondered why the Decepticons were here if the bot's reason for being here was because they were chasing them.  
  
From the bots point of view, it looked like Jack was happy with himself for a second as he looked down at a rock he pulled out from his pocket when a look of realization dawned on him, the young wizard then looked back up at Optimus. “Umm, Optimus? Question: if you guys are here because the Decepticons are, then why are they here?” he asked. “In part, they are here because our planet is uninhabitable, ravaged by centuries of civil war.” Was the primes simple answer. Raf then pointed out, “the latest war because of you and this Megatron guy, who leads the Decepticons. But he definitely doesn’t seem like the nicest guy as of the late few eons.” Raf said for the others, just so Optimus didn’t have to lie or drabble about something he honestly didn’t need to. The prime nodded in thanks but also addressed the young psychic, “as much as it is useful for the ability to read our minds young Raf, so we may skip explanations, I do ask for you to stop please.” Raf seemed to turn sheepish and the glow in his eyes fully disappeared as he dropped out of his shift, “sorry, psychic’s first instincts. I’ll stop now unless someone needs me.”  
Jack continued with his questions, “so what does, any of this… have to do with us?” “Megatron has not been seen nor heard from in some time, but if his return is imminent as I fear, it could be catastrophic. And since you now know of our existence, I fear that as of last night, the Decepticons know of yours.” “Got it, if we see any strange vehicles we got the okay to shred ‘em. Can we go now?” Miko then turned to Jack as if he was crazy. “Are you kidding? I’m living a dream here in bot-swana, name any fae on earth who has had the chance to actually meet real aliens, I’m not going to let you or anybody else shatter it.” Miko said looking stern at him. “It is best that you three remain under our watch, at least until we can determine our enemy's intentions.” Optimus said when Ratchet then spoke up, “Optimus, with all due respect these children are in as much danger here as anywhere. They have no protective shell if they get underfoot they will go… squish.” As if to make a point Ratchet lightly stomped his foot but it didn’t seem to disturb the teens.  
  
“Is that it?” Miko asked, “I thought you would have guessed by now that appearances can be deceiving.” She then went full shift again and stretched out, obviously she wouldn’t be squished. “I can fly if that makes a difference,” Raf said going full shift again but this time flying up to Bee’s height as he spun in circles around the bot who beeped and buzzed excitedly. “I got an item that can get me in the air, bruu-ma.” Jack called out and a broomstick suddenly appeared out of nowhere landing in his hand, he hopped on and was then flying around in the air before stopping at a decent height not too far from Optimus. “It appears we do not need to worry old friend, the children have it under control.” An alarm then went off as all the bots and shifters looked around.  
“What’s that?” Jack asked flying up to the screen that Ratchet seemed to turn to, but Bumblebee answered him with buzzing he couldn’t understand so Raf told him. “Proximity sensor, someone’s up top.” Raf said pointing up. “It’s agent Fowler.” Ratchet said checking the security cameras, on screen as two humans came walking out. One; African American, the other; seeming to be white and holding a duffle bag over their shoulder.  
  
“You mentioned Fowler before but who’s that other guy?” Jack asked. “Special agent Fowler is our designated liaison to the outside world, though I do not have any knowledge of the one following him. He tends to visit only when there are issues, it may be best if you do not meet him at this time.” The shifters didn’t need to be told twice as Miko shrank down to size and hid with Raf and Jack, but Jack sensed something as he heard the elevator come down. “Guys, we might be in trouble. One of those guys have magic, if they can sniff out our magic…” Jack said looking to the two who seemed to pale.  
When the door opened Fowler was the first one out followed by the apparent newcomer. “Seven wrecks, thirty-four fender benders, a three-hour traffic jam, and a particular note. Numerous reports of a speeding motorcycle of unknown make and a black and yellow custom muscle car.” Fowler said looking at Bumblebee and Arcee. The newcomer though seemed to look directly at the position the teen shifters were hiding, before looking around and taking a particular interest at the bots as they seemed to look at them judgingly but not in a rude way, just quizzingly.  
“So, anything you care to get off your tin chest prime?” Fowler asked as Optimus came up to the leveled railing just at his chest. “We have the situation under control agent Fowler.” Optimus said bluntly but with honesty, the newcomer seemed to smirk at the primes words but he made the motions as if he was snickering but no sound really came out, just soft wheezing of some air. Fowler continued, “They’re back aren’t they?” “If you are referring to the Decepticons, I have doubts that they ever left. Your planet is much too valuable.” Optimus responded. “Then it’s time to wake up the pentagon.” The newcomer looked at Fowler with a shocked expression when he said that but looked back to Optimus who became a bit more firm, “hear me agent Fowler, we are your best, possibly only defense against the Decepticons threat.” “Says you.” The newcomer backhanded Fowler’s shoulder when he said that and looked at him straight in the eyes, having everyone’s proper attention.  
  
Fowler seemed to relax a little and then looked back to Optimus, “which is why I’ve been meaning to introduce you to someone, meet lieutenant Denzell Spix. He will be sticking around here in your base as my eyes and ears when I can’t be here, if any of you for any reason try to get rid of him I can easily say we will have a problem. You're officially on thin ice prime, take this as a gift so you know when you’ve messed up.” Denzell stepped in front of Fowler and saluted up at Optimus.  
“Hey fleshy, did anyone get splattered on that freeway? Team prime knows when to use force, and how much to use.” Bulkhead said grabbing what looked to be a mechanical arm off from Ratchet’s desk and then crushing it with one servo. “Bulkhead I needed that!” Ratchet shouted at the green bot. Denzell pinched the bridge of his nose and held his head down, he clearly wasn’t impressed. “Enough!” Optimus shouted getting everyone’s attention again then looking back to Fowler, “military involvement will only result in catastrophe, perhaps you can condone widespread human casualties agent Fowler, I however, cannot.” ‘Clearly’ Denzell thought looking at the prime. “Then do us both a favor and handle this prime, under the radar. Or I will.” Fowler said leaving in the elevator but not before taking one last look at Spix who nodded.  
  
When Denzell knew Fowler had left he dropped the bag he had over his shoulder and jumped down from the level he was on and jogged right up to where the teens were hiding before the bots had a chance to stop him, he did a two-finger whistle to get the teens attention and then looked around the corner with a cross expression. The three of them looked at him meekly, “umm… hi,” Miko said doing a little wave. He stood back and clicked his fingers and pointed for them to get out from where they were, they followed without word feeling like one of their parents had just caught them hiding after they broke the cookie jar or broke a car window. When they were all out and standing in line in front of Denzell the soldier crossed his arms and looked up at Optimus for an answer.  
“Before you and Fowler arrived lieutenant Spix, a few of my Autobots had been accidentally discovered by these children, and for the time being they will be remaining here in our protection.” Denzell smacked his forehead hard at that answer, this was maybe the last thing he needed to see after Fowler had left. He started using sign language to the teens and waited to see if any of them would respond, thankfully Raf did but he didn’t read Denzell’s hands he skipped to reading his mind. “He knows we’re shifters and he’s not going to tell Fowler immediately, but he would like to know who we are and just get introductions out the way for all of us.” Denzell blinked confusingly at Raf because that was not what he asked in sign at all, when he saw Raf shift.  
  
“My name is Raf, or Rafael Esquivel, and I’m a future psychic. I know I didn’t read your sign because I don’t know it, so I just read your mind since only Miko knows sign.” That summed things up for Denzell. “What do you mean by ‘sign’?” Arcee asked looking confused. “It’s short for sign language, it’s basically making gestures with your hands that translate to words. And it’s normally how deaf people talk,” Jack answered. “Or people who can’t talk, in Denzell’s case.” Raf answered. Denzell stretched down the turtle neck he had on and revealed the long plethora of scars he had decorating his neck, which Miko awed at and Bee buzzed at seemingly in amazement to.  
“Wow! How did you get those?” Miko asked, Denzell asked who she was first assuming she might have been Miko. “Oh! Sorry, yeah I’m Miko. I’m an oni and 1,500 years old, Jack said that you have some magic about you, so what’s your shift?” she asked. _‘Well to answer you’re first question I got these serving in Afghanistan, and for your second I’m a young immortal.’_ Denzell answered. “Well? What did he say?” Bulkhead asked. “He said he got the scars from fighting in Afghanistan, and that he’s a young immortal.” “Please don’t tell me he’s another ‘shifter’ like you.” Ratchet said to the little girl.  
  
“Nope, immortals are a part of the shifter or- ‘fae’ community, but they don’t actually transform like us. Their called blind shifters, and there are a few more types like that but immortals are basically just the best example. But if you are an immortal, then how come you didn’t heal from that injury? Immortals are the rarest fae in the world so that’s a pretty bold claim.” Jack asked sounding skeptical, Denzell answered. _‘the shifters in Afghanistan dipped their weapons in magic ruling elixirs, so basically they canceled my natural magic so I couldn’t heal, and I was lucky enough to be found. But I can heal fine now, so if I get under their feet I can come back.’_ Miko answered Jack for him though, “they poisoned their weapons so it cancels his natural healing magic so I can assume when he got hurt the injuries he got were permanent, but he says he’s fine now so whatever he gets now he’ll be fine from.”  
“How good of healing are we talking here? And what exactly is an immortal in your terms?” Ratchet asked sounding intrigued by this so far. “Good enough healing where if you guys were to squish him he would regenerate from that, and an immortal is as simple as it sounds, he literally can’t die from any cause. The downside is though that they can’t use magic to the same extent we can, they’re kind of are limited.” Miko explained. “What exactly is limited for you guys?” Arcee asked, “the basics, basically. Making something levitate, and a few mediocre things.” Jack explained and Denzell clicked his fingers and pointed at the young wizard to show that he was right. “He can only do one small thing at a time, lift objects, open one personal pocket dimension, super strength, magic sensing, and summoning a weapon.” Raf said cutting the needed explanation off.  
  
“So…” Bulkhead started, “we kind of got side-tracked from introductions apart from Miko and Raf,” he pointed out. Everyone looked at each other in realization of that, but to wrap up introducing the shifters Jack went first. “Well, I’m Jackson Darby but please, call me Jack. And I’m a wizard of balance.” Jack said extending his hand for a handshake which Denzell took with a smile. He then looked up to Ratchet, expecting him to go next. “I’m Ratchet, the team's medic.” “Arcee.” The two-wheeler introduced bluntly. “Bulkhead, though I think you already know from before.” Denzell looked to chuckle at that. Bee buzzed and waved his hand in hello, “that’s Bumblebee, but he likes to be called Bee.” Raf answered for the yellow bot. “And I am Optimus Prime, I welcome you to the team lieutenant Spix.” Denzell waved his hand in a ‘no’ gesture before signing to Miko. “He says to call him Denzell or Den,” she answered.  
  
  
After a bit of mingling, Raf had offered to do the same thing for Jack that he had done to Bee so that Den could talk. But the wizard had to deny, because Den was an immortal his body would unconsciously drain the magic of the charm so doing the same thing he planned to help Bee with was a no-go.  
  
Optimus had become a little curious about what exactly shifters were to their culture, Jack had taken to explaining it himself. “Humans who are able to naturally generate their own magic are collectively called fae, there are different types of fae; shifters are like me, Raf and Miko. We can physically change our appearances into what non-fae call mythical monsters, my type of shift is a wizard of balance, I can control and tamper with the magic of negativity and positivity in the world and if need be transfer them and swap them. Raf like he explained before can see into the future or past and also move things with his mind and read others, but he is a hybrid of a fortune teller and a normal psychic. Miko is a sort of class of shifter called- titan; titans are basically shifters who can grow far past their normal height, which is why she can grow as big as Bulkhead but me and Raf can’t. She’s basically a Japanese demon, like she said before they are spirits of darkness and mainly generate negative magic, the girls are normally more versed in magic than the guys. Den is like what we said before, a blind shifter. A fae that can’t transform but are still magical, they are really rare and even then are hard to find because they don’t generate a lot of magic that others can sense. The last is one we don’t have an example of, they are simply called monsters, fae that are stuck permanently looking something like Miko or worse, but they are normally hiding where non-fae can’t find them.” Jack did his best to explain. “Why would you hide yourselves? If you are all the same race, then shouldn’t you have a right to show yourselves in public?” Optimus asked. Raf answered that, “nobody knows, but the theory is that at some point in the past fae became shunned and called fakes. So when after a few generations of non-fae discovered normal fae they were attacked and feared, that’s why we try to hide ourselves because they fear what we don’t understand. Kinda like what you guys are doing,” Optimus could understand it, it was an easy comparison.  
  
Ratchet had asked if there was a place he or the others could learn sign language from, Miko told them to maybe take online classes or read a virtual book on it. Jack was going to take the easy way by making a charm so he could understand it and Raf could just read Den’s mind only for that purpose, psychic’s found it a bit of a taboo if you learned to sign when you could just read the person's mind. And Miko had learned sign a while ago, she was over 1,000 after all.  
Denzell had set himself up in the old quarters of the missile silo, apparently he was to be staying there whether the bots liked it or not. Which was when things led to now, as everybody was either flying around the main area or just chatting, when Ratchet got a signal on the monitors.  
  
“Blasted earth tech!” the old medic shouted. “Cliffjumper’s signal popped back online.” “Who’s Cliffjumper?” Miko asked in her full shift not standing too far from Bulkhead as she found him the most interesting, Bee buzzed the answer but Raf spoke it. “A friend of theirs who was killed recently…” the tween said hushly. “How is that possible?” Optimus asked sounding surprised. “It isn’t, another bug, the system is chock-full of them.” The medic responded. “if there’s any chance that Cliff’s alive…” Arcee said. “Ratchet, prepare sickbay, we may need it.” Optimus said, his face guard clapping together. “What can we do to help?” Miko asked walking up to him, “Remain with Ratchet.” Miko was so not taking that for an answer. She activated her magic in giving her a boost as she grew up to Optimus’s height, two extra pairs of arms sprouted under her main pair as her muscles developed as well as her horns, when that was done she summoned six spiked clubs out of smoke for each hand and a battle-ready grin out from under her teeth. “Wrong answer, I wanna kick some tailpipe.” She said through a growl.  
Optimus looked at her and seemed to give a little thought as to what Miko wanted, she knew how to get into people’s heads so it was clear she must have some experience at least in the psychology of fighting or war. “How much fighting experience do you have exactly Miko?” he asked. “1,000 years’ worth, been training since I was 500.” She answered. The prime then looked down to the young wizard, “Jack?” “Me? Well… I haven’t lived as long as Miko but I’m decent in combat magic, but even if I can’t fight I could possibly help bring this Cliffjumper guy back.” He answered. “Raf?” Optimus asked. “Oh no, I have next to no experience in psychic combat, I can predict I’d be a liability.” Well the prime was thankful that at least one of the children was spared of fighting combat. “Denzell?” Optimus asked turning to the actual human solider, who simply shook his head indicating he was a no-go. It wasn’t like he couldn’t fight, he obviously could, but he would be going up against Cybertronian’s and if he was to simply get squished he would be out for a few valuable minutes.  
  
“If you two wish to accompany us, you must stick close. That I make an order.” Optimus said. Miko grinned and walked over to Bulkhead who was smiling almost like an idiot as he had watched Miko go even further and now her having these awesome clubs. Jack summoned his broomstick and flipped up his hood, giving a thumbs up that he was ready to go.  
Ratchet typed in some coordinates and out of nowhere a portal appeared down a tunnel and the bots started to run into it, “Autobots, roll out!” Optimus shouted as he and the others transformed and drove through the tunnel. Jack flew after them behind Optimus and Miko ran at the back of the pack behind Bulkhead, when the portal closed Den clapped his hands and pushed one forward, a- there you go, vibe rolling off him. Ratchet raised a brow and looked to Raf for answers. “Magic can create portals to, I guess Denzell is just happy to see something familiar.” The tween answered.  
That then gave Ratchet a thought however, if they had something similar to this with their magic, then he wondered if maybe they could use it instead of wasting the energon. So he asked, “Ah… would it be possible to use your magic to travel through space?” “My magic? Definitely not. Jack’s magic? Possibly, if he made a wave stone.” Raf answered, “what’s a wave stone?” the medic asked, it peeking his interest. “A wave stone is basically a rock that teleports you somewhere another wave stone is on contact,” Raf said. “Could you, for example, use that to travel between planets?” Ratchet asked. “The farthest that’s been tested has been from mars to earth, but we don’t exactly know the limits. You want to maybe place one on Cybertron though, and considering that’s light years away I can’t say for certain what the result would be.” Ratchet was surprised when the little boy said that but had to remind himself that Raf was a psychic, and a future predicter to an extent. If he couldn’t read your mind about it then he could see into your future for it.  
Den patted Raf on the shoulder and pointed to his head signaling for the boy to read his mind, “Den says he’s sorry about your planet, nobody should have to go through that.” Raf said looking up at Ratchet. “I thank you for your sympathy, but unfortunately, sorrowful words won’t bring back our planet.” Ratchet said looking back to his screen and seeming to get back to work. Raf with the air now somber and quiet, went to go work on his laptop, and Den went to a more open space and started practicing his stances in taekwondo.  
  
With the bots on the other side of the ground bridge, they raced through with their blasters at the ready when they landed. “Energon mine.” Bulkhead whispered, “judging by its scale, the Decepticons have been tunneling here for quite some time.” Optimus said looking around. It seemed they landed in a small empty clearing, but they still had to find cover soon, they kept low to the ground as they looked around for a decent hiding spot when Miko took a sniff of the air. “Phew, this stuff reeks of magic ash.” Miko commented. “What’s magic ash?” Bulkhead asked as he was the closest to her, “basically a slang saying for something very powerful, if I had a wardrobe made of this stuff, I would be the most powerful wizard in the state.” Jack answered. “Make sure you take a few souvenirs then,” Arcee quipped, “way ahead of you, and some. If you guys need this then I’ll be taking a lot for you.” Bulkhead looked back at the kid, “and how you plan to do that?” Bulkhead shut his vocalizer when he saw Jack create a small portal and move it over a large crystal shard of energon before closing it and breaking off the energon. “I can teleport it to a pocket dimension that basically has infinite space, while you guys fight, I can get this stuff.” Jack said continuing onto the next piece. The bots had no problem with that as long as he didn’t get hurt.  
  
While they moved forward Jack stayed behind to get the energon they pass, but went into hiding when they hid behind a dirt pile to scout out the vehicons. Once Optimus was confident that they would be fine taking out these drones he stood up from their hiding spot and walked forward with his blasters ready, “let’s find Cliffjumper.”  
When they came into plain view of the vehicons they all aimed their blasters at them which the bots did in return before it became a battle zone. “Shifters! Keep fire away from the energon, it can be combustible in this state!” Optimus ordered obviously not wanting to say Jack and Miko’s names. “You got it!” Miko shouted back spinning and swiftly dodging blasts from the enemy before carrying the momentum and bashing in the cons together and far. Jack stuck close to Arcee and used ice attacks to freeze them in place before the two-wheeler came and shattered them. They continued to run down the tunnel until they came across the final horde, “maximum overdrive!” Optimus shouted transforming along with the others and running in to run over the vehicons. Miko did charging sweeps to the cons, staying low to the ground before tackling them but kept on running to keep up with the bots. Jack stayed in the back, making sure they actually killed the vehicons with some mild electricity before moving forward.  
  
They eventually came to the end of the tunnel and hid behind some containers to see if they could find Cliffjumper from where they were. Bulkhead whistled, “quite an operation.” The green bot said before blaster fire was quickly upon them. The bots blasted back, and Jack did his best to aim with ice attacks as Miko chucked her clubs at them and when they hit their target she would summon them back, it was the best she could do for long-range in a sense.  
Arcee looked around while the chaos happened, spotting a familiar red. “It’s Cliff, I have a visual.” She said and Jack saw it to, something that didn’t look like a con so he could take a guess in saying that was Cliffjumper. “We’ll cover you, go!” Optimus said. Jack flew above Arcee and made two light energy bars appear under his broom, “jump on! I’ll fly you up there,” he shouted and zoomed off when Arcee got a grip, straight to Cliff they were heading.  
  
When Jack dropped Arcee what was there was something that made Jack turn up his nose, the purple liquid that surrounded the bot felt the exact same as the energon except on the other side, this blue energon was the good, and whatever this purple was, was the dark. But whatever it truly was left Arcee stunned beyond words, when blaster fire started to rain down on them Jack made a shield that ricocheted the fire back and Arcee managed to get to Cliff to have a good look at him. He was cut in half from the shoulder to hip and glowing a slight purple, “Cliff?” Arcee whispered. She was met to by a savage snarl and the red bot trying its best to punch or hit her with its current condition. Jack saw that this was a problem for later so he made a portal under Cliffjumper and teleported him to a separate pocket dimension from the energon he had gathered, Optimus and crew had gotten the fire off their backs so Jack looked around for maybe the other half of that bot when he found it not too far from the floor. “Arcee! Grab back on, I think I found his other half.” Jack said coming in close to Arcee.  
She jumped back on and Jack spun around and down to the floor where they landed not too far from Cliff’s other half, Jack made another portal and then that was the end of it, they had Cliff and a decent amount of energon this could not have gone nearly so well, until it didn’t by the sound of laughter.  
  
“Prime!” a bot who Jack and Miko didn’t recognize addressed Optimus, their first guess was that this guy was Megatron. The bots came up to the lift and looked up at the slim bot who seemed to have wings on his back. “I’d stick around but I’m squeamish.” The bot said then dropping apparently what was a bomb before leaping into the air and transforming into a general dynamics F-16 fighting falcon jet. Jack made another portal but instead of it being a pocket dimension, it actually teleported the bomb somewhere else. Jack sent it out into space for safekeeping. The crisis averted, except for the boom that would have gone off soon.  
Jack zoomed over to Optimus at eye level and quickly shouted out a question, “Optimus what does an energon explosion look like?” “A big plume of blue smoke and ash, why?” Bulkhead quickly answered. Jack hoped he was getting this right, he took out another pebble from his pocket and whispered something to it before throwing it into the air, it shot off like a firework and made an audible sound of an explosion followed by a big plume of blue and grey smoke then a bunch of dirt and rock seemed to cover the entrance from the top but there was still light in the ditch they were in. Jack then came down to the ground and opened a pocket portal, then grabbing out a small amount of energon that he whispered to as well, when the gem glowed Jack released a breath he didn’t know he was holding.  
  
The bots looked at Jack and eyed the glowing energon carefully. “What did you do?” Miko asked. “I made a big illusion surrounding the entire mountain, and the best part, the cons shouldn’t be able to find the place again. So all of this energon, should be ours.” The bots looked at Jack as if he was Primus himself that just walked in. “How?” Arcee asked in disbelief. “I just had to get a little creative. Make a fake explosion and smoke, then keep the illusion of the rubble with something a bit more powerful, and bim-bata-boom we now have the place to ourselves. And if the cons try to come back here, they’ll just get a whole lot of nothing with tech scrambling magic. I’d give you a full explanation but I’m about ready to pass out, I need some sleep.” Jack said sitting down. Arcee then walked up and crouched next to him, to make sure he was okay and to also talk. “What did you do to Cliff?” she asked, sounding almost a little aggro. “made a second pocket dimension to store him in, he’s fine for now.” Jack said. “Arcee what of Cliffjumper? What happened?” Optimus asked walking up to the two. “See for yourself,” Jack said opening the pocket portal to Cliff that Optimus could see into. The prime gasped and looked taken aback at what he saw, “dark energon.” He said quietly but bluntly. “That makes sense, the guy rank of the exact opposite of this normal energon. I’d hope you have a way to fix that?” Jack asked.  
The prime shook his head sadly. “Dark energon has the ability to revive the dead, this is not something that can be fixed. Cliffjumper is as good as lost to the all spark.” Arcee gasped but Jack quickly stood in, “hold up, as soon as I get my energy back I might have a way to reverse it with a lot of magic, nobody give up just yet.” Jack said. “How the hell are you going to fix that? I’m over here and I could smell that anarchy, that’s way too much for someone like you to transfer over to the one he needs, and even then, how are you going to put him back together?” Miko asked with her clubs gone and her arms crossed.  
“I’d hope you and Raf would help. First get you to consume enough of the darkness so I can convert it, and use gold to hold him together.” Jack answered. “But these guys don’t have their own natural generation of magic, he’ll fall apart without a consistent source.” Miko rebutted. “They do have at least two sources that can substitute for it, but he will still need help from my magic every now and then until his body is strong enough to hold itself up. This is theoretically plausible.” All of the nonsense that Miko and Jack were talking about went right over the bot's heads as they looked among each other in confusion.  
“Okay, so all we need is enough gold to fix him and then we should be set on materials.” Miko said clapping her hands together. “Exactly, and I should have the rest at my place that I can bring back to the base.” Jack said smiling up at the oni. “So to summarise for those who don’t know magic, are you basically saying you can get Cliffjumper back somehow by tomorrow?” Arcee asked sounding honest like she didn’t believe this. “Yep, assuming I get a good sleep and all that.” The teen wizard answered. “So we’re done here?” Bulkhead asked. “Should be,” Miko responded, “let’s get out ‘a here, my host parents would be freaking by this point.” “Same with my mum, and I can bet the same with Raf.” Jack said standing up and ready to leave. “Earth customs,” Optimus said as if he didn’t take too much into account of the children’s personal lives, perhaps that could create a domino effect if they were not careful. The prime then commed Ratchet, “Ratchet, prepare a ground bridge at our coordinates.” The prime said. “What of Cliffjumper?” Rachet asked, “something I will have to talk to you later about unfortunately.” Was the primes simple answer.  
  
A ground bridge then appeared a little bit in front of them, and Raf flew through before he immediately plugged his nose. “Wow, what reeks in here of positivity? It’s almost like walking into a candy store or sugar factory.” The kid commented summing up what Jack and Miko thought of the place to. “This blue stone apparently, energon. And a great conductor for positive energy which I plan to use,” Jack said before realizing this would be a perfect spot to ask Raf for the help that he needed. “Hey Raf, aside from that, I have another plan brewing to help the bots out. Can you use your psychic abilities to make seismic imaging? I need to know if there is a massive amount of gold around here.” Jack said.  
Raf quickly read Jack’s mind and saw what he and Miko were planning, he nodded with a smile on his face and from where he was in the air slammed downward, creating a loud shockwave which he used to carry out his psychic abilities far underground for the gold ore. The bots, especially Bee, grew concerned for Raf as they watched him but the kid didn’t shout out in pain so they could guess that the action he just did was intentional. Once the tween found a decent sized amount, he told Jack, “I found a good enough piece you can use, but it’s under a bit more energon, if I were to rocket it to the surface it would explode the energon.” Raf said looking at Jack. The young wizard stood up and came over to where Raf was on the ground, then used his magic to sense out where Raf had found the gold. When he locked onto it he gestured for Raf to move, when the kid hopped out the way Jack muttered something and soon quickly after a large ore of translucent gold shot out from the ground. When it solidified it dropped out of the air and Jack caught it in another pocket dimension, “that should be it. Let’s leave.” Jack said summoning his broomstick and looking back to the others who didn’t need to be told twice.  
  
When they got back, Ratchet and Den were there waiting for them. Ratchet looked around and found that Cliffjumper wasn’t with them, “what happened? What of Cliffjumper?” the medic asked. “Something I can hopefully fix,” Jack said floating down to Ratchet’s eye level and opening up the pocket dimension that he was storing Cliffjumper in. Ratchet looked in and gasped as the zombie-like Autobot looked up at him and snarled. “By the all spark…” Ratchet said in disbelief, but then processed what Jack had said. “Wait, you can fix _that_?” Ratchet asked almost shouting while looking at the young wizard. “Yep, I said before how I am a wizard of balance, which means I can transfer darkness to light and vice-versa. Hopefully tomorrow after I rest up a bit I should be able to fix him with Miko’s help,” Jack said landing on the human platform and taking a seat.  
Ratchet though wasn’t happy with that answer, ever since these teens have gotten here everything he knew about the law of science under the last few hours had been shattered. “Cliffjumper is a mutated and butchered con experiment! And you’re telling me you have a way to fix that?! No medic on Cybertron would be able to fix that, what makes you think you could?” Ratchet asked angrily.  
  
“Simple laws of equivalent exchange and a whole lot of what-ifs and theories. Just turn the dark energon into its opposite, and then use that to boost his life force, and then fill his body up with the energon we just got, then stitch his body back together with gold, and then wait a while for him to heal properly. The dark energon has already brought him back to life, we just need to turn it into the positive he needs, so whatever he has for a life force can start to operate on its own over time. And apparently energon is a great magic booster, so by process of association, when I give him the new energon it will double as his normal fuel and as a boost to the magic I’ll introduce to him, it will also strengthen him so he can recover quicker. Gold is an excellent magic conductor, so if I tie him back together with that it will add another boost to the magic while also holding him together, and siphoning off my own magic a bit so the energon will know to keep on making him recover.” Jack said trying to get in as scientific as he could with his magic hoping that would satisfy Ratchet, but he was obviously no alchemist.  
The medic seemed to be satisfied by the explanation on what would do what, but was still not happy that he couldn’t do anything to help. Raf had read Ratchet’s mind and stood in to hopefully cheer the doctor up, “but all of that is to just get him acting normal and an aftermath plan. We obviously don’t know anything about Cybertronian biology or how Cliffjumper would feel after this, so once the magic mumbo-jumbo is out of the way we’re wandering in the dark.” It didn’t take too much of a little detective work and common thought to assume that Raf had just read Ratchet’s mind since they could tell that the doctor felt useless in this situation. “I thank you for the attempt of making me feel better Rafael but as I’m sure you must be able to tell it’s just not the same as actions speaking louder than words.” Ratchet said but honestly was glad that Raf was thinking of him.  
  
Optimus then turned to the teens and back to Jack who looked exhausted, recalling the conversation they had in the energon mine about their earth customs. “As I recall before in the mine you needed to be heading home soon did you not?” He asked watching the teen's reactions as they realized the time, Den nodded and signed that he could give them a ride home. “Den says he could drive us home,” Miko says. “I’m afraid the issue of your safety still remains, so I must insist that the children be accompanied by one of the Autobots.” Optimus said addressing it to Den. The immortal seemed to ponder it then shrugged and gave the thumbs up, he didn’t mind as long as they were actually being protected. “Very well, Bulkhead you will accompany Miko.” “Sweet! My host parents will freak!” Miko said getting giddy about the reaction on their faces. “And maintain covert surveillance in vehicle mode.” The prime finished. “Curbside duty, got it.” Bulkhead said turning to Miko. “Aw,” Miko said now bummed out that she couldn’t witness that and in her exaggeration turned back to normal. “Bumblebee, you’ll watch over Raf.” The young scout looked to Raf and seemed to smile and Raf did the same flying over to him and sitting on his shoulder. “Ratchet?” the prime asked honestly not sure what the medics response would be. Ratchet was conflicted, at one end he wanted to talk to Jack more on his procedure to fixing Cliffjumper, the other was the obvious, his vehicle was an ambulance so he wouldn’t be able to really stick around Jack’s house without some other humans getting suspicious. “Wish I could, but an ambulance is to suspicious.” Ratchet said looking at Jack. “I could shrink you, you wouldn’t even need to stay in vehicle mode, people would think you’d just be an action figure.” Jack said throwing an idea out there. Now that was something Ratchet was semi-familiar with, mass change, Jack would theoretically just be giving him the ability to do that. “I suppose that would work, but what is an action figure?” Ratchet asked. “A small toy.” Ratchet felt a little annoyed that he was going to be shrunk down enough to be the size of a toy for them but if it would get him and Jack talking then fine. “Arcee, you will be Jack’s transport then.” Optimus said. “Fine.” The two-wheeler says reluctantly.  
  
  
After everyone had been paired up they were quickly on the road, Ratchet had been shrunken down and was sitting with his head poked out of a hoodie Jack had on with the same method he used yesterday with Charlie. They had stopped at a gas station so Jack could get something for the little guy that he would be moding later and the bots were curious as to what it was as it jingled when they drove. “What exactly is that?” Ratchet asked as the item had been stored with him in the hood. “It’s a cat collar for a new familiar at my place.” “What’s a familiar?” Arcee asked. “Basically a pet but with superpowers, there’s three at my place now and all of them have a human level of understanding, so that’s a few people you have to watch out for.” Jack answered as they turned another street. “I saw you doing the same thing yesterday with what you’re doing with Ratchet, did you have another thing in the hood then?” Arcee asked. “Yeah actually, the same familiar I got the collar for. A bully at my school threw his corps at me at work because it's considered bad luck for a wizard or witch to come across a dead cat. Jokes on him though, now I got my first familiar.” Jack said then pulling up into the garage of his house.  
When he parked, the door leading to the house from the garage swung open and who was there was a young boy around six with black hair. “Jack!” the boy said running up to him and hugging him almost making the young wizard fall over. “Charlie! Get back here! You can’t go running off like that,” Shen shouted coming up to the doorway in his human avatar. “Wow, you picked up quick Charlie, I’m proud of you,” Jack congratulated the young kitten. “Charlie we told you to go to bed,” Jay said when he got to the door, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. Jack then looked to the little guy and smiled, “come on trouble maker, I’ll make you a warm chocolate if you start to head to bed.” Jack said earning a smile from the little guy and then running off back to his cat bed, Jay went to go make sure the little kitten actually stayed in bed, closing the door.  
  
That then left Jack and Shen. Shen then closed the garage door and looked at Jack with a furious look, “do not take me for a fool Jackson Darby, where the hell have you been? And I want the truth.” The peacock said crossing his arms at the young wizard like an angry parent. “I’ve just been out, I don’t know why you’re so mad at me all of a sudden.” Jack said now getting sweat start to build up. “Strike one, you didn’t want to talk to me or Jay about why you came back late last night either, we’ve been raising you since diapers Jack, and we know you always like to get home as soon as possible and that you’re not the most outgoing person so there is no place you could have gone that you wouldn’t have told me or Jay about.” “I’m sixteen I can’t be telling you guys everything I’m doing.” “Strike two, I can see that you are extremely exhausted and I can sense that your magic is really depleted, you must have been doing something to spend that much magic.” “Okay, I’ve been out practicing a bunch with some of the more complicated spells that I know you told me not to do, happy?” “Strike three, you’re out. We saw you Jack, me, Jay and Charlie, we saw you fighting those massive robot aliens and that you have one in your hood and the bike you came in on is one as well. We saw you risking your neck for these guys, which I will say is very noble of you, but goddam were you cutting it close by the skin of your teeth, it took nearly everything in me and Jay to not go in rushing after you.”  
  
Jack and the two bots he had with him felt what they had for blood run cold. “Charlie is already practicing his human avatar, and what comes before that is teleporting between where the home is and the master, when we got to that we come in on you talking to these metal giants who are completely sentient without the use of magic, and reveal to actually be aliens.” Shen said pointing a hand at Arcee. The two-wheeler transforms and looks down at the transformed peacock, “I believe we might have made a bad first impression then, hi nice to meet you, my name is Arcee, and who would you be?” the motorcycle said sarcastically. “I am Shen Darby, one of the family's familiars and Jack’s teacher. While I thank you at least for making an introduction, I want to know what you have business with Jack for, and please don’t skip out on any details.”  
  
So Shen was told the whole story about yesterday and today, and what they hope to do going forward. Shen breathed in sharply from his nose and clapped his hands together before pointing them at Jack, “I nor Jay or Charlie will tell your mother about this. But you better introduce us tomorrow or I will personally put you under house arrest.” Shen threatened then looking back up when he heard a car driving up, “oh, speak of the devil. I’ll go and tend to dinner while you tell her why you suddenly have a motorcycle.” Shen said opening the garage door and then walking inside.  
Arcee quickly transformed and Jack had put his hoodie on right, so now Ratchet was hiding in his pocket in vehicle mode. When Jack’s mother parked in the driveway. “Jack?” she asked stepping out of her car and wondering why he was out here let alone why he was awake. “Don’t freak, I can explain,” he said trying to come up with something to use to explain why he had Arcee. “Can you? Jackson Darby we’ve talked about this.” She said walking up to the bike. “Yeah I know, and-” “you don’t know. I worry about you enough when you’re not here, now I have to worry about you driving a motorcycle?” “I’m sixteen, a wizard at that, and I can’t be driving a ten speed forever.” Jack argued, playing the fae card again. Jack had got his wizard part from his dad, and his mother was a non-fae, completely normal.  
“How did you even afford this?” she asked. “Umm… Amber got it for me, it was cleared from Griffin Rock so she gave it to me as a gift.” Amber was a pen pal of his that he spoke to often. He then walked over to the workbench they had and what was on it was a grey motorbike helmet, “I may have been a kid when I got this, but I’m not anymore. You always tell me to make responsible choices, well, I’d figure I’d really start to duck my nose into it.” His mother seemed to buy it. “Well I’m glad you finally have a reason to wear your helmet, every single time you ride!” she said making it very clear. “You will take me out for a spin every once in a while.” She said walking in doors, “we’ll see.” Jack said walking in with her before taking one last look at Arcee and smiling then closing the garage door and turning off the lights.  
  
When they got inside Shen had heated up some spaghetti he made earlier and left it on the table for them, “dinners ready for you guys.” He called to them then about ready to retire for the night. Jack had gone straight to his room and took Ratchet out of his pocket placing him on his bed and taking off his shoes and jacket as he was heading straight to bed afterward. Ratchet transformed and took a proper look around him when he watched Jack begin to head back out of his room, “I’ll keep the door closed and chat to you when I get back.” The wizard said hushly before exiting.  
  
When he got back, he immediately dove for his bookshelves and opened a massive spellbook and flipped it to a marked page before sitting back down on the bed. Ratchet had been exploring a little bit across all the pushed together furniture and was sitting against the bedside lamp when the teen came back. The Autobot medic jumped back to the bed and looked at what Jack was reading only for it to make no sense as it was all a mass of runes and an alphabet he did not know. “What in Primus is this?” he asked. “A beginners book for balance wizards, I’m basically just brushing up my incantations so I can cast the spell tomorrow for Cliffjumper.” “What does it say?” Ratchet asked since he didn’t have any knowledge of what language it was, even his universal translator couldn’t figure it out. “Basically a few theories and hypotheses based around the deliverance of types of magic. Some magic is cut clean and simple while others can be more complex, types of water magic fall under the latter, and some like positive magic can go to the first. But sometimes the mood of the magic, or, effects, can change dramatically by how it’s conjured or summoned. So it’s important I figure this out now.” Jack placed the book to the side then got off his bed again and opened the bottom-most draw on his bedside table. It was completely full of messy notebooks, all of them looked to have been read through more than a thousand times, easily looking like a well-read through books with many page markings and the smeared ink or lead, Ratchet comparing it to some of the notes he had to take when he was studying for med school.  
  
Jack took out at least five different notebooks before grabbing one that wasn’t full yet from the top of his bedside table, he opened the full notebooks onto some specific pages then pulled out a small piece of energon from a portal, then a small drop of purple goo from a separate one which Ratchet could hear Cliffjumper snarling from. When Jack set the two in front of him he got to writing in the not full notebook with a pencil, and surprising to Ratchet, Jack began to sing what he was writing.  
  
 _“Cut the strings of hope, catastrophic deeds…  
_ _Burn all means to cope, and set the spirit free…”  
  
_ The dark goo seemed to glow brighter with each word and the normal energon seemed to dim, while Ratchet suddenly felt a chill run through his lines.  
  
 _“Wither and decay, end this destiny…  
_ _Break these earthly chains, and set the spirit free…  
_ _The spirit free…  
  
_ _Take what has been hurt, grant them cold mercy…  
_ _Bend and break the reigns, and set the spirit free…  
  
_ _The spirit free…”  
  
_ The energon had turned purple and the goo started to turn black, what that meant, Jack had no idea, but Ratchet had an idea he would like to voice if he could get over the miserable coldness chewing at his energon.  
“I think those words affected the energon, the raw one you have turned into dark energon and the goo I can assume is reformed dark energon but you turned it into something else.” Ratchet commented but was chittering through most of it and looked rather pale if he could somehow manage that. “It’s darker than dark energon, so I think I’ll dub it eclipse energon. Now let’s fix it.” Jack commented turning to an open page and began to write again as well as sing.  
  
 _“Power, gleam and glow, let your hour shine…  
_ _Make the clock reverse, bring back what once was mine…”  
  
_ The energon began to turn back to normal and the refined dark energon did as well.  
  
 _“Heal what has been hurt, change the fate's design…  
_ _Save what has been lost, bring back what once was mine…  
_ _What once was mine…”  
  
_ The goo was now refined energon and the raw energon was now white with a silvery glow, a crystalline sheen. That was new to Ratchet, he was glad though that he felt better, but this energon was far more interesting. “Nice, but I could do something better.” Jack said then turning back to writing but this time no singing.  
  
“Power of the sun, gift me with your light, shine into the dark, restore our fading sight, rise into the dawn, blazing star so bright, burn away this strife, let my hope ignite…”  
It wasn’t as much a song as more of a poem but it did affect the energon, the raw was now glittering in gold and the refined a crystal white almost like water. Jack was right when he said how energon was a great magic booster, it was now also a great constructer and conductor as well.  
Ratchet was amazed, this would definitely be something he would have to take note of when he got back to base, he was curious as to what the effects of this new energon would have on a Cybertronian, if the thought of it even having different effects would be a thing like red energon. The ‘eclipse’ energon as Jack dubbed it, Ratchet was terrified of, and was quick to chalk it up to simply being a more concentrated dark energon so he didn’t have to mess with it. Normal dark energon messed with a bot’s head, he could almost imagine that this eclipse energon was like poison for them, tar running through their fuel lines, never to be messed with.  
  
This white energon and gold energon though intrigued the doctor, he would have to ask Jack to make a sample for when he gets back. But oddly enough the teen wizard wasn’t done yet, he opened another blank page and began writing again and this time singing.  
  
 _“Day to night, dark to light, f_ _all the sands of time.  
_ _Let the years like the gears, of a clock unwind.  
  
_ _In your mind walk through time, back to better days.  
  
_ _Memories, like a dream, wash tears away.  
  
_ _Like a star in the sky, darkness can't reach you.  
  
_ _Light the night, joy is light, till the new dawn.  
  
_ _Cast away your old face, let go your spite.  
  
_ _With this light, for others plight, I’ll save your fate.”  
  
_ When Jack finished the energon reverted back to normal. And with that, he was now officially calling it a night, he bookmarked the notebook with the pencil and left it under his lamp. He spent no time teleporting the other notebooks he got out back and the bigger book he grabbed, then turning to face Ratchet. “It there anything you need in particular so you can sleep?” Ratchet shook his helm and climbed back up to Jack’s bedside table and transformed. “I can recharge here, have a decent power down.” And with that, Jack could assume Ratchet fell asleep. The teen followed suit not far after, just sleeping in his clothes and letting his soft breaths fill the empty room.  
  
He was going to be in for one hell of a day tomorrow.


End file.
